On June 10, 2008, Alexei Miller, CEO of Russia’s Gazprom, told a French audience that crude oil prices would reach $250 a barrel in 2009. His former Gazprom cohort and then freshly minted Russian prime minister Medvedev did him one better… pegging crude oil prices at $500. Was it wishful thinking? Did the gentlemen overdose on “hard-money” investment newsletters and Peak Oil Theory? We may never know.

The Russia-Ukraine battle for natural gas played out well last year for these three natural resource stocks, and it’s happening again. J. Christoph Amberger of Today’s Financial News predicted back in November of 2008 that the Ukraine would go into a “deep freeze” and that forecast came to pass at the beginning of this year.